Seven Principles to Enable Perpetual Innovation

Since our founding in 1998, VMware’s culture has always been about delivering innovations to meet our customers’ evolving technical and business needs. Growing from a lean startup to become a company of over 34,000 team members worldwide with nearly $12B in annual revenues, we are faced with an on-going challenge: how do we maintain a culture of perpetual innovation and keep that startup spirit alive within a large global enterprise? 

As CTO of VMware, I know that perpetual innovation is the lifeblood of any technology company. Over the course of my career, I have worked in academic research, commercial research labs, startups, leading-edge Silicon Valley technology companies, and a global financial institution. Through these varied experiences, I know that innovation happens organically and inorganically, and often proceeds in unplanned ways. You must have an innovative mindset and a dedicated investment fund to catalyze off-roadmap innovation and empower people to come up with disruptive ideas and experiment with them. Better to disrupt yourself than be disrupted by others.

The following seven principles have inspired a culture of perpetual innovation at VMware. Interestingly, they do not make our job easier as they require a certain element of dis-satisfaction with the status quo and often some cross-organizational friction. We have learned that innovation involves an inherent tension between opposite points of view. When nurtured in a respectful way, this approach can lead to better outcomes despite some challenges. This creative tension is part and parcel of our culture of innovation that delivers results.  

1.     Innovation begets innovation.

Real-life innovation is a verb, not a noun. It is a process that requires forward disruptive momentum in addition to “business as usual.” Once the initial hurdles such as funding are overcome, the forward motion increases in velocity, attracts more adherents to the disruption, and becomes a self-reinforcing cycle. This is how we generate new products and solutions, stimulate organizational alignment and progress, and become a force for advancement of technology that enables customers to achieve their objectives. 

2.     Sometimes you have to push back — on pushback.

Taking “no” for an answer can sometimes stall the development of innovative solutions before they actually get off the ground. More often than not, the innovator’s journey is driven more by force of will than planned product evolution. The pushback forces the innovator to hone and refine their ideas and have the staying power to keep going in the face of credible challenge. If one gives up too easily or is unwilling to accept some criticism and pivot an idea in a new direction where the problem takes you, then things stall. Or the innovator can step-back, reassess, and either validate or pivot the direction and accumulate incremental success that accelerates to a productive outcome that overcomes the critics with effective results.

3.     There are good lessons from failure.

As we challenge each other’s ideas, we find that identifying what won’t work can be a helpful sieve: whatever makes it through are the ideas and technical outcomes that deserve ongoing investment and resources. This process also helps us build the mental muscle and fortitude to go the distance and become a catalyst for others to join in the fun. Even failures are sometimes good motivators as the market reality often teaches us that our ideas might not be as valid as we might have originally thought.

4.     Innovation requires collaboration.

In my experience, highly compartmentalized approaches, my-way-or-the-highway attitudes and fiefdoms are obstacles to really impactful innovation. While true collaboration can sometimes feel like a slower, more difficult path, it usually produces more refined, sophisticated solutions. This is why some of the most remarkable innovations are the product of one really insightful idea combined with a collaborative team effort to bring that bright idea into a useful product feature or completely new product.

5.     Listening has a distinct “look” to it.

We strive to embody what listening to customers and other stakeholders looks like. True listening helps us arrive at a deeper understanding of their needs and helps us identify opportunities to address them in optimal ways. Continuous re-validation of assumptions along the way is critical. 

6.     Bold ideas are good. Bold action is better.

Great thoughts are enabled by persistent actions.  Taking ideas into action sounds easy but is actually quite hard.  I like to remind my teams not to confuse activity with progress. Things can go sideways quickly so there always has to be a vector of progress that we measure ourselves against. This is how we help set the disruptive technology agenda for ourselves, and how we create the potential to influence the direction of the industry. 

7.     Diversity is a competitive advantage.

We actively seek out and include people who bring diverse thinking, skills, backgrounds, perspectives, approaches, and their authentic selves to collaborative problem solving and co-innovation. I know from decades of experience that this is how great advances are made, how lasting innovation thrives, and how material progress is made.

These seven principles have created a thriving environment at VMware that continues to drive useful and important innovations for our customers. If the world described by these principles excites you, we invite you to innovate with us by finding an opportunity at VMware 

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